Career orientation and reorientation.

Drobot, Loredana ; Petrovici, Merima ; Rotaru, Ileana 等

1. INTRODUCTION

The personal development of each person is necessary in the conditions of a flexible work market. The internal configuration of a work market changes in connection to the demands imposed by different professions, and the external configuration changes according to different professions.

The professional orientation activities based on a static model--compatibility of a personal characteristics model with the characteristics of a certain occupational domain--are no longer correlated to the reality. Thus in professional orientation and reorientation, the organizational counsellor will keep in mind the education of young and adults in order to obtain independence and flexibility in the following domains (Dessoche, 1986):

--personality knowledge;

--occupational information regarding the profession;

--taking decisions regarding a certain profession;

--development planning in the professions selected;

--identification of solving methods for problems that may appear during the professional trajectory.

Career orientation in Romania has encountered a series of problems of a conceptual nature--the orientation represented the peak for specialized staff and was built parallel with the education process. Because the professional orientation can be obtained only in specialized centres, the human resources departments were not sufficient for the sustaining of this process, the demand being too high.

In certain organizations, the human resources department also has the role to counsel the employee in planning, developing and reorienting his career. Ideally, each department of human resources must benefit from a centre specialized in orientating and reorientating the individual's career.

Nowadays, the organizational psychologists, where they exist, exercise counselling attributions. But this role doesn't belong only to the psychologist. Because career orientation and reorientation is a domain found at the intersection of other domains: economic, management, sociology, psychology, law etc., the person named to take these attributions may be selected from the domains specified. Still, the dominant activity is counselling and it is recommended that the specialist obtain an initial training in psychology and sociology.

The problems in Romania can also be of a methodological nature--the career orientation is taught in different stages: 5th grade stage, 8th grade and 12th grade stage; during these stages, the students don't have the necessary time or the decisional capacity to start an orientation.

For an adult, professional orientation represents a true problem and it is begun as a result of individual and social necessities, in centres, organizations and institutions through proper financial resources or through European investments. Such centres should "pressure" the professional life by the construction and the development of national identity.

2. INSTRUMENTS USED IN CAREER REORIENTATION

The instruments that can be used are the following ones:

a. The genograma--supposes the discovery of the professional experiences genealogic tree of offspring, the representations and missions that were given to them and the work values they received.

Through this method, the animator invites the subject to build his/her genealogic tree. In order to use the tree, the reflection must be centred on professional life, on work and on the representations transmitted from one generation to another. The subject must write, for each member of the family, the date of birth and of death (if the case), the home town, the professions and other data (for example, 5 professional qualities). The subject is also asked to formulate messages regarding work that may characterize the persons in the genealogic tree. Finally the counsellor proposes the introduction of key words, a drawing or a citation that symbolizes the work connection for each parental line.

The genograma is a powerful emotional instrument and the counsellor must be careful in using the information must be gathered in a professional manner. He may formulate the following questions:

--What is the structure of the individual's social trajectory?

--Does individual have continuity in his work?

--Where does the individual stand in connection to the parents' plans?

--What were the professional challenges for the anterior generations?

--What familial patrimony has the subject inherited?

b. The biograma. The Henri Dessoche grill and the rational autobiography is a useful painting in observing the connection made between formal and non formal studies, between social and professional activities, on a chronological scale (Dessoche, 1975)

We observe that in order to realize the past activities analyses, to observe competencies, we may use the explaining of experiences and the instruments that help creativity. Due to creativity instruments the subject will have the advantage of projecting in the future, in a dream. These kinds of exercises represent stimulation exercises, and the instruments used in this case may be the following: the description of the ideal professions, the hero of professional life and imagery.

Spranger has classified the individuals in five types of preponderant values:

--theoretical, with references to knowledge, research;

--esthetical, with references to art, culture;

--domination, referring to influence, power;

--altruist, with references to he assistance given to another;

--practical, referring to the methods and techniques used (Husson, 1985).

Holland has identified six types of personal inventory: the realistic type, intellectual (orientated towards research, study, experiments), artistic (centred on emotions, intuition, originality, expressing of feelings), social (the helping, care and assistance relations), entrepreneur and conventional (Drobot, 2008).

The values auto-exploration exercises follow the observing of preferences and choices made on a professional plan. Here we can observe questions like:

--Can you enumerate the extra-professional qualities that make your family and your friends appreciate you?

--Which extra-professional qualities do you frequently use?

--Which are the qualities you may transfer to the professional sector?

Other questions may address the practical profession and the managerial function:

--Which are the activities that you prefer?

--Which are your routine activities?

--Which are your personal qualities used at work?

--Which are the difficulties met? etc.

c. Projects correspond to the confrontation among desire and reality, history, will, individual possibilities and possibilities offered by the social and economic context. The reality allows the re-adaptation of the project according to the possibilities of the subject, to the desires invested and to the motivation degree. This elaboration phase needs to be studied and compared with other methods. Collaborators from outside the school can also be involved by offering their help in this case.

The project represents the individual's projection of the future and through it the subject can observe his/her proper style, according to which he manages his/her career.

The balance counsellor helps the subject to observe the authenticity of the project, his intentions, choices and fantasies, which do not have any connection to the subject's competencies and history. The balance counsellor analyses the project according to two axes (L'Hotellier, 2008):

--the authenticity and the validity of the project by reporting it to the individual;

--the project is also possible in the social and economic frame of the subject.

The counsellor can not be an expert on all projects, but he must favour the approaches that allow the subject to connect to the reality. In order to facilitate the project, its sharing will be proposed, in several stages, through an action plan and a detailed schedule or by realizing a graphic plan of his intentions.

The project finds its origin in the motivation and in the will of the person, but neither the impulse not the desire are enough for the realization of the project. In fact the project allows the evaluation of permanent developing of the subject, of his self identity contained by the temporal development

As a conclusion of the article we will offer an exploration guide for the validation of a project. The following questions may be asked in order to formulate a future project of the subject. The questions are formulated according to different domains or area of every day life.

The environment as a life area is discovered by using the following questions:

--Which are the events, the persons and the facts that gave you the idea for a new project?

--Which are the events, the persons, and the fact that made you continue this project?

--Who did you first talk about your intention?

--Which are project objectives that will lead to its positive results?

The answers may be: a greater interest for work, personal reconnaissance, the need for a change, the desire to realize a dream, the desire to choose her/his destiny, the taste of risk etc.

--Which values and personal gestures will be included in the project?

--What personality treats will be necessary?

--Which qualities will help and which won't?

--What could stop the project to succeed?

--How do you see the project in 3, 5 or 10 years?

Another domain that needs to be studied in a project is represented by the family life of the subject. The following type of questions may be used:

--What is you family's position towards the project?

--May the project modify the family equilibrium?

--Does the project create a connection or a breaking in the values recognized?

--Is you family affected by the project and in which manner?

The existence of a network is another helpful domain in the realization of a project. Here are some examples of questions that can be used in this case:

--Do you have colleagues, relations, friends that can help you?

--Is the project individual or do you wish to apply it together with a friend?

--What are the elements that ensure the success?

3. CONCLUSIONS

The introduction of a Balance Counsellor in Romanian schools represents a novelty, but the problem would be the specialization of this person, even if he/she can be recruited from the psycho-sociology specialists. The individual seances or the groups' ones may represent a self knowledge possibility and the preparation programmes can be a success when they are based on the proper professional development needs of the subjects.

In this article we have tried to propose some possible instruments that can be used in career orientation or reorientation.

4. REFERENCES

Dessoche, H. (1975). La societe festive (The festive society), Editions du Seuil, Paris

Dessoche, H. (1986). Autobiografie raisonne et maieutique de projets (Reason authobiography of projects) in, Histoires de vie, Tome II, G. Pineau, G. Jobert, Editions L'Harmattan, Paris

Drobot, L. (2008). Pedagogie sociala (Social pedagogy), EDP Publishing House, ISBN: 978 973 30 2057, Bucharest

Husson, A. (1985). L'orentation professionalle continue. Developpement et emploi, (Continuous professional orientation. Development and use), FNEGE, Paris

L'Hotellier, A. (2008). Le travail methodique de project (The methodical use of the project), revue Education permanente, no. 86

Tab. 1. The elements of the biograma

Years Professional Professional Social Events that
 development experiences experiences have
 marked the
 private life

 Total no.